if I didn't know better
by recycled-stars
Summary: Inspired by the ABC promo for Always. Beckett and Castle reach an understanding. Or come to a conclusion.


The customary preamble: Hi. Yes. I know. I kind of disappeared. And I haven't written anything for _Castle _in quite some time, so I may be a little rusty. And certainly a little less, um, happy ... than some of you might like. This is a little ditty based on the ABC promo for _Always _so avert your eyes if you're going completely spoiler free.

Also please don't hate me? Thank you in advance.

* * *

She kisses him.

.

.

There are things that happen before that. There are conspiracies and murders and faceless men pulling strings to execute them. There is the widow of a good man who wasn't always good. There are scars that bother her more than usual and there is her badge on a desk that used to belong to Montgomery. There is an investigation Castle has hidden from her for months and there are his words. Always, it seems, there are his words.

They echo in her head as she walks. It's raining and it's cold, for May, and she's wet and she's thinking in her head that he said he loved her. Again.

And again, she fumbled over her line.

_I love you too_. Four words that should be easy to say because she knows they're true with everything she is, all the things she has fought to make herself for him, but she chokes on them every time.

.

.

She has too many words.

She has too few.

So when he answers the door she kisses him.

.

.

His hands are like her wet clothes. They cling to her skin and leave gooseflesh in their wake. And they're warm (his tongue in her mouth is warm) but she feels cold, she feels empty, she feels want but it's greedy and it's not at all like she wanted this moment to be.

The door shuts behind her and she closes her eyes and she kisses him until she can't hear herself think over the noise of it in her body.

He breathes over her lips and thumbs along her jaw but she doesn't open her eyes because she can't look at him looking at her, can't see what it is she's about to ruin with the inner monologue she knows she has to share.

"Kate."

She expects more, but it's all he says and it hovers somewhere between a statement and a question and a plea.

She bites into her lip, looks down at their feet. "Please Castle. Can't you just make a joke about getting me out of these wet clothes and."

She swallows.

"And?"

He prompts her gently.

She steps forward and curls her hands to fists against the hem of his shirt and tugs it up, off.

She kisses him again and there's no question in how he kisses her back.

.

.

It's not bad.

(She doesn't think it could ever really be _bad_with him.)

But it's not good either.

Her body has always been aware of his; she's always wanted him. And she does, want it, and desperately. But as hard as she tries, she can't pretend it's for the right reasons. She can't pretend that she knows what she has to say as soon as it's done. She can't pretend that it doesn't feel empty, like a cheap move on her part.

Because it is.

It's all his hands searching her flesh where their bodies meet, slick and fast and painful, because this is much too soon. And it's her wanting to feel it less, wanting to feel it more, burning and shaking against the flat of his thumb, eyes closed and tongue curling at the corner of her lip in concentration because she thinks that maybe if she just _thinks_ hard enough it would feel _good_.

(And then he finds a spot that has her moaning in a way she doesn't expect, and she hates herself _more_because it does feel good, so _fucking_good. She thinks that maybe she tells him that.)

"Look at me," he says.

She shakes her head a little, grabs at her chest, moves faster, harder against his hand and against him.

His fingers press into her hips and she thinks maybe he's trying to hold her still, slow her down, but she can't still and she can't slow down because she's not sure be able to come at all if she does and she wants to, for him. She can tell he's enjoying it because she is, or at least, she's pretending she is.

Or.

She is.

But not like he is, not like she wants to be.

.

.

She pulls on her shirt before she says it.

"I love you too."

He looks hopeful for a second, but she's only halfway through her sentence. She presses her finger to his waiting lips, silences his reply.

"But I have to do it."

The joy on his face so quickly gives way to something else, something solemn and tumultuous, like anger, like fear, like the absence of hope.

He nods, just once. It's not reprieve. She knows he won't forgive her this again, if it comes to that. (And she knows he shouldn't have to. She sees in him a man who has been pushed beyond the limit of his patience and is fast approaching the limit of his love.)

The rest of her clothes follow the shirt in turn.

She swallows and looks down as she buttons her damp jeans. "I'm sorry."

"So am I."

They leave it at that.


End file.
